Elliott Cuff

Mon 29 March 2021 11:23, UK

It has been made abundantly clear in recent months that Everton are interested in signing a new long-term right-back this summer.

The Athletic recently reported that Carlo Ancelotti was keen to find a long-term successor on the right side of defence, with club stalwart Seamus Coleman nearing the end of his career.

With that in mind we at Goodison News thought it the perfect time to look back at how Coleman would become arguably Everton’s greatest value for money signing in the Premier League era.

Brought to Everton from Sligo Rovers in the League of Ireland Premier Division for a measly £60,000 in 2009, Coleman only played a bit part role for the Blues in his first season, playing just three times in the Premier League before leaving on loan.

Coleman spent the second half of the season with Blackpool in the Championship where he excelled for the Tangerines, earning himself a larger contract extension upon his return to Goodison Park, where he would go on to star as right-sided midfielder.

Though he featured regularly in defence for Everton during the 2012/13 season, it wasn’t until the 2013/14 season that the Ireland captain became such an integral player for the Blues.

Under Roberto Martinez, Coleman became one of the Premier League’s most impactful full-backs, with Everton arguably having the world’s best full-back pairing in Coleman and Leighton Baines during that season.

The Irishman scored six times in the league that season, all goals courtesy of Martinez’s desire to see his full-backs surge forward, with Coleman named in the PFA Team of the Year.

That was really the first season where fans and pundits alike began to realise just how effective Coleman could be, though it would be a few years after that before Manchester United would firm up their interest in the player.

What a play-by-play of Coleman’s career on Merseyside can’t reveal however was just how important the Irishman would become in the dressing room at Goodison Park.

After Phil Neville left Everton in 2013, Phil Jagielka was handed the captain’s armband by the club. Jagielka was a key player for the Blues and an underrated bargain signing in his own right, but he never really operated as the club’s de facto leader.

Jagielka wasn’t communicative enough at the back to come across as Everton’s go-to man. Baines had become an icon for Everton but he didn’t have the personality to be the club’s captain, and if we’re honest, neither did Jagielka.

Coleman always did though, and so even before he inherited the armband from Jagielka in 2019 he was Everton’s defensive general who had so much to say both on and off the pitch.

Even today, with Coleman now 32-years old and approaching the end of his time as an Everton player, the Irishman continues to be an example to young defenders both on and off the field.

Carlo Ancelotti recently compared Coleman to John Terry, Paolo Maldini and Sergio Ramos, citing the trio as excellent professionals and great role models for their teammates, just like Coleman.

The former Sligo Rovers man hasn’t quite stolen the headlines in recent seasons like he once did under Roberto Martinez, but Everton don’t really have any other players who embody the same spirit that Coleman does.

Coleman has always fought for his teammates and for the club that he’s spent more than a decade with, and his attitude has never been anything less than sublime during his time as an Everton player.

In his prime he was a deadly weapon for the Blues to utilise but it’s his personality that separates him from the rest, and that’s why, forget the price tag, he’s arguably Everton’s greatest ever signing in the Premier League era.

In other Everton news, Ancelotti is ‘intent’ on signing Robin Olsen on a permanent basis this summer.